Dearest Readers,
In my Rogues of the Sea trilogy, three swashbuckling lords of Regency England and their
adventuresome ladies dare everything for perfect love. The trilogy begins with Swept Away By a Kiss
(nominated for RT Book Reviews’ Best First Historical Romance) and continues with Captured By a
Rogue Lord and In the Arms of a Marquis, each a sizzling stand-alone romance.
I am thrilled now to offer you a taste of the series as an exclusive e-novella, A Lady’s Wish, the
love story of dashing war hero Captain Nikolas Acton of the Royal Navy and the girl he spent one
glorious day with and could never forget. I hope you enjoy Nik and Patricia’s scandalously passionate
reunion, including cameo appearances of the heroes of my trilogy.
Happy romance and adventure!
Warmest wishes,
Katharine
KATHARINE ASHE
A Lady’s Wish
Contents
A Letter from the Author
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Epilogue
Author's Note
About the Author
By Katharine Ashe
A Sneak Peek at CAPTURED BY A ROGUE LORD
Copyright
About the Publisher
Prologue
Two gentlemen stood upon the busy Portsmouth dock, the chill gray of February hanging over tall
masts, broad decks and draft-drawn carts porting cargo to and fro. Pulled by a squat tug, a ship with
furled sails moved slowly into berth along the quay, an elegant beauty, long as she was lovely, and
powerful with fifty-six gunwales and a brace of iron pivots atop.
“A war hero, you say?” The younger gentleman, the Marquess of Doreé, dark of hair and eye, with
bronzed skin and a quiet air, studied the vessel.
“They say,” the Viscount of Ashford drawled, a hint of the Continent in his tone and garments. The
latter were as costly as his friend’s yet with the faintest suggestion of the dandy about them. His hair,
short beneath a silk hat, glistened gold even in the gloom.
“Does he deserve the praise?”
“He does indeed.” Lord Ashford glanced at the marquess’s sober visage. “He is a good man. I
believe he will accept our offer.”
“No wealth to amuse him? No title to bind him?”
“Comfortable wealth won upon the sea against Boney. Youngest son of a minor squire. Rather, too
much time on his hands now that the war has ended.” The viscount’s amber gaze shifted to the officer
at the vessel’s helm, the man they had come to see. “Too much time in which to remember, and not
enough activity to distract from those remembrances.”
The marquess nodded, wise already despite his youth. “And if he accepts?”
“I will send him after Redstone, of course.”
Lord Doreé turned his head and assessed the viscount carefully. Slowly a crease appeared in his
cheek.
“I daresay,” the viscount murmured.
“You will hire him to follow Redstone, but at a discreet distance, I trust?”
“Naturally. Don’t wish to send the fellow to his death, after all.”
The slight grin faded from Lord Doreé’s mouth and his black eyes remained watchful. “Redstone
will not be swayed to our cause. He is another sort of man altogether.”
“I am not so certain of that.” The viscount lifted a brow. “He steals from the rich to give to the
poor, Ben.”
“You may have played at being a pirate, Steven. But Redstone actually is one. He has killed more
men than you and I have combined.”
The viscount’s eyes turned again to the man-of-war now slipping gracefully into her berth, the red,
white and blue banner of empire snapping proudly atop the mizzenmast.
“And yet,” he said quietly, “I will wager my fortune that our brave naval captain here has
outstripped you, me, and Redstone together in that particular category. Desire for acknowledgment
can lead a man to extraordinary lengths.”
“Ah.” The marquess scanned the deck for its captain. Though not yet above thirty, their quarry
carried himself with authority, confidence in the set of his shoulders and the cast of his jaw. “When
will you meet with him?”
“No time like the present.” The viscount tapped his silver-tipped walking stick upon the planking
in affected impatience. But they had waited four months already since the treaty that ended the war
with France sent this sailor home to England after eight years upon the sea—this man they hoped to
make an ally before he lost himself to the inevitable pleasures of society he had once left behind in
favor of the theater of war.
Their work was noble, though unpopular. Yet here was a man who might be convinced to labor for
them.
Upon deck the master of the 1500-ton warship called out orders to his men, his uniform of crisp
blue and white favoring his broad frame.
“Welcome home, proud son of Britain,” the viscount murmured. “Welcome home, Nikolas Acton.”
Chapter One
“A true hero!” The matron fluttered her lacy kerchief beneath Nik’s nose. Or perhaps beneath her
own. It was a very large nose, like the nose of her daughter beside her. “My darling Tansy and I read
of your commendation in the paper, Captain Acton,” the mouth hidden beneath the cliff of the nose
gushed. “I said to her, my dear Tansy, if a true hero is to attend the ball tonight, and such a handsome
one, we must make his acquaintance if we should be so fortunate. And now we are so fortunate!”
“It is my honor, ma’am.” Nik bowed and turned his attention upon the lady’s daughter. The girl had
a sweet smile and bright eyes. Appreciation for the nose could be learned.
But apparently the persistent sense within him that something was missing in the lady—in all
ladies—could not be unlearned. Despite his efforts. For nearly a decade it had been the same. From
smiling misses to stunning widows, he found himself searching for something he recognized.
Something he had lost.
“Oh, no, Captain. It is our honor entirely!” The matron nudged her dear darling Tansy forward.
Nikolas set a gentle look upon the girl. “Would you care to dance, Miss Chapel?”
She nodded. They danced and he studied her smile. Chandeliers sparkled, violins trilled, flutes
piped, guests laughed over glittering champagne, and his partner was a perfectly amiable young lady.
His mother and sisters would be in alt. Home barely a month, and already he was seeking a wife.
“A wife,” his mother had urged, “will help you establish yourself in society,” as though Nik wished
for none other than that.
“A wife,” his sisters had giggled, “will spend all that gold you won at war,” as though otherwise he
might spend it all on carriages and cards.
“A wife,” his father and elder brothers had glowered, “will finally thrash the fool boy out of you,”
as though eight years at war had not already seen to that.
A wife, Nik hoped, would force him to cease searching for that which he had not found in nine
years.
“Captain Acton, you are staring at my mouth.”
Not staring, precisely, merely lingering there in distraction.
“I beg your pardon. I am charmed. You have a lovely smile.” A sweet, natural smile, in truth. But
not the same. Never the same. He had only ever found remnants. The curve of a lower lip upon one
lady. The glimmer of laughter in the eyes of another. The tilt of chin affected by a third. Hair, eyes,
hands, shoulders, even the fabric of her gown. Everywhere he went, in every woman he encountered he
saw memories of the girl he had known for a day, and lost just as swiftly.
“Oh.” Miss Chapel dimpled. “I imagined a crumb stuck to my chin.”
Nikolas chuckled then lowered his brow. “Absolutely not, madam. You appear pristine.”
“Tiresomely so,” she sighed, “although my mother would scream to hear me say it. But that spark
lurking in your green eyes suggests you would rather that I appear other than I do.”
“Never. And may I say, your blue eyes are quite as fine as your smile.” But not cornflower blue.
“La, Captain. You will put me to the blush,” she said disingenuously, but her dimples deepened,
lessening the effect of the nose between them. “I am a painter, you see. I notice such things.”
“Aha. Such things as?”
“The color of a person’s eyes and the expression within them.”
He smiled again. Yet nothing stirred within him but mild appreciation. It never did. Only that once.
He had been searching for that feeling—for that woman—ever since. Eight years ago the madness
of searching in vain had driven him to war, escaping into the exclusive world of men to make himself
halt his insanity. But now it was beginning again. A fortnight back in London and he looked for her
everywhere, upon the street, in drawing rooms, in the lips and eyes and hair and hands of ladies he
danced with in crowded ballrooms.
It was no way for a man to live. For a sailor, the master of a ship trained to hold his attention upon
present concerns, it was lunacy. He’d thought his time at sea had broken him of the habit.
Apparently not.
“You are sad,” his partner said. “And perhaps frustrated to be here tonight.”
He released a short breath. “Miss Chapel, I fear my social graces have suffered in my absence from
society. I beg your pardon for my poor behavior, for so it must be.”
“Not at all, sir. I am simply overly observant. It is my curse.”
The dance ended. He returned her to her mother but found he could bear no more of the lady’s
rhapsodic compliments or her daughter’s perspicacious regard. He excused himself and walked to his
club. No females could be found there to draw him into idiocy, or in the case of Miss Chapel,
incivility. Nothing but gentlemen happy to eschew distracting feminine company for drink, game and
conversation.
He scanned the General Chamber, tilting his hat to a pair of men he knew well—Braverton and
Halloway, both white-haired officers at least twenty years his seniors upon the sea. But he was in no
humor to talk with sailors tonight, especially not the happily married sort like these two. He required
the company of men for whom women were merely momentary diversions, not lifetime commitments.
Or obsessions.
He moved into the parlor and his shoulders relaxed. The answer to his prayer sat alone, perusing
the paper. Wealthy, urbane, and as carelessly roguish as could be with the fairer sex, Alex Savege was
precisely the man with whom Nik needed to spend time now.
He crossed the chamber, settled into the chair opposite his old school mate, and waved to a
footman for a drink. The Earl of Savege lifted his attention from the paper in his perfectly manicured
hand and a slow grin crossed his mouth.
“Ah. The hero returns to set himself down amongst mortal men. To what do I owe the honor of
your much sought after company, Acton?”
“Enough of that at the ball I just escaped, Savege.” Nik accepted a drink from the footman and
tilted it to his mouth.
“Daresay,” the earl murmured. “The very reason I tend to avoid balls.”
Nik relaxed back into the soft leather chair. “How is your brother, Savege?”
“The same.” Not even a flicker of interest showed upon the earl’s handsome face. Three years
earlier Nik had ferried Alex’s twin to England as a favor. Coming off the battlefield in Spain, Aaron
Savege had been half-dead. But perhaps Alex was simply better at hiding his thoughts than Nik. In
school, Alex and Aaron had been close as brothers could be.
“And your family?” the earl asked. “I understand your sisters are taking society by storm.”
“You do? Spending more time at balls than you care to admit?”
Savege grinned. “My mother and sister reside in my house here, of course. It is sometimes difficult
to avoid hearing about that in which one has little interest.”
“Do they—” He halted. Why had he come here and sought out this friend’s company if he would
broach such topics? The earl lifted a single brow in studied languor, just as he had when they used to
drink themselves under the table in Cambridge. Now, however, rather more sobriety shadowed his
gray eyes. That sobriety bade Nik continue despite his better judgment.
“Do they press you to find a wife, Alex?”
“What man’s mother and sisters do not, Nik?”
“Point.” Nik took a sip of his brandy, the same restlessness he had felt for two weeks unsettling
him again. “Do you ever consider obliging them?”
“Why on earth should I?” This said with no inflection whatsoever. The rake was a rake, Nik
understood well enough, because he did not in fact care.
Nik passed a hand across his face, surprised to find his jaw tight as well.
“Are you considering it?” The earl’s tone remained perfectly smooth.
“Perhaps.” Perhaps a wife would end the insanity of searching for her once and for all, searching
for a girl who had left him waiting. A girl he had never deserved anyway. “Actually, I’ve had an offer
from quite another direction that I am considering.” He surprised himself in saying it aloud. He’d
barely given it a thought since that day he stepped off his ship in Portsmouth and was met with a
remarkable proposition from a gentleman he did not know.
He did not know Ashford, true. But amongst his fellow naval officers he’d heard rumors, odd
rumors given the gentleman’s foppish style and Continental drawl. Rumors that Lord Steven Ashford
was not what he appeared to society. The tiny lines about his amber eyes and sun-touched hue of his
skin suggested those rumors might be true—that Viscount Ashford occasionally captained his own
ship, a ship dedicated to an intriguing purpose. Ashford’s words to him that day proved it.
“An offer from a more appealing direction?” A wolfish gleam lit Alex’s eyes.
Nik chuckled. “Quite another direction than that as well.” He rubbed his jaw. “I had thought to
purchase a house and settle upon land now that I have the wherewithal.” Wherewithal he had lacked
years ago when he met a girl to whom he would have given it all, a girl whose dress and air
proclaimed her a lady of the highest breeding, no matter her sweetly candid manner with him.
“But?”
“But after a fortnight of balls, this offer tempts me more than I had imagined anything would tempt
me to return to sea so soon.”
His friend’s eyes hooded.
Nik released a short laugh. “What am I saying? You wouldn’t understand anything of the wish to
be at sea or not, you libertine. No women to be found there.”
“Indeed.” The earl’s fingertip traced the rim of his glass.
Nik’s brow creased. “You’ve read about Redstone in the papers, I suspect. The pirate that likes to
harry the ships of spoiled noblemen.”
“I believe I have heard of him, yes.”
“I’ve been offered the opportunity to go after him, but only to watch him.” Ashford had been quite
clear on that point. “Deuced peculiar mission, don’t you think, to search out a pirate then sit like a
duck on the water without apprehending him?”
“I’m afraid that I haven’t an opinion on the matter one way or the other.”
“Of course you haven’t.” Nik tried to shake off his discomfort with a laugh. But it clung. “But . . . I
thought I might do it.”
“Then no house or wife after all,” Alex said smoothly. “This offer has not come from the Lord
Commissioners of the Admiralty, I take it?”
“Private interest.”
“Ah. A paying interest.”
“A fellow would never agree to such a job otherwise.” He tried to grin. “Even a war hero with sacks
of gold.” Gold his father and brothers seemed to think merely proved his weak character, as though he
had charmed French ships out of their treasures. But he had been a different man before he went to
war, as careless and carefree as they believed.
Except concerning one girl.
A footman appeared by the table. “A letter for you, Captain.”
Nik accepted the envelope from the silver tray. The hand was familiar. He and John Grace had
corresponded since their school days. Throughout the war whenever Nik made land in Spain, Colonel
“Jag” had found a way to meet him. Together they drank, chasing away with laughter the monotonies
and horrors of the war they were fighting on sea and land.
“I shall leave you to your post.” Savege unfolded from his chair with absolute grace, elegantly
unscarred by any life other than pure hedonistic amusements. He could have laughed at Nik’s
ponderings. But he had not. Alex Savege might be a thorough rogue where women were concerned, but
with gentlemen he was nothing but decent.
Nik stood and extended his hand. “It is good to see you again, Savege. Give my best to your
brother, if you will.”
“I will.” His grip was firm and, oddly for a man of his indolent habits, slightly calloused. “Best of
luck to you in coming to a decision. And if you should happen upon that nasty Redstone—” his eyes
glittered “—beg him to have mercy upon my yacht, will you?”
Nik laughed. The earl released his hand and departed.
Nik settled back into his chair to open the envelope, and had to halt himself from reaching for the
dirk in the sash he no longer wore. He did not miss the war, but he missed the weight of his rapier at
his hip and pistol beneath his arm. An unarmed man was a man who could be wounded.
Are you capable of wounding a man?
I should hope not!
Excellent. Then I have nothing to fear.
He commanded a knife from a footman and slid the letter open. A single sheet of foolscap
unfolded, another paper within it bound with brown string.
24 February 1816
Paris, France
Captain Nikolas Acton
c/o Farthings & Cholm Solicitors
Oxford Street
London, England
Dear Nik,
I trust you are well. I have been ordered by the general to set off at once for Calcutta and am
pressed with last-minute preparations. I write in haste before departing with a commission for you.
In truth, I trust only you to accomplish this task.
A close companion of my early years on the Peninsula—a gentleman I believe you met on one of
your brief sojourns on land with us—discovered a treasure of great worth while there. He is no
longer in a position to retrieve this treasure. Now, heading East, neither am I. Because of previous
instructions left by my friend, however, the treasure will not remain long in its present location in
England. In short, it could easily be lost.
I now put into your hands the map my friend fashioned. You must retrieve the treasure before 15
March of this year.
Yours &c.
Colonel John “Jag” Pressley Grace
Nik unbound the map. He nearly laughed in relief. No dotted line wended its way about the paper,
no X marked the spot. The “map” was rather a list of inns, posting houses, villages, and rivers. All the
places were familiar enough, running from London northwesterly toward Wales. He knew that
countryside well, indeed. He had spent a year scouring it, searching for a girl. And he had begun his
search in that very village at the end of the list where Jag’s friend had buried the treasure.
He sipped his brandy slowly. Jag was an honest man. Nik hadn’t any doubt the treasure was above
board.
His gaze shifted across the chamber. As a younger son without prospects, profession, or wealth, he
had not been welcome at clubs like this. Now he had the funds to match men like Alex Savege at the
gaming tables any day he wished.
He did not particularly wish it. And he did not wish a wife, either. Not yet. Not until he finally rid
himself of asinine memories and foolish regrets. Ashford’s offer was preferable to enduring his sixmonth-long furlough in the state he’d spent the past fortnight. The viscount had named an April 1
sailing date. Nik would accept that offer. Until then this treasure hunt would fill the time.
The fifteenth of March. Less than a fortnight. And the destination—the Shropshire Hills—where,
on a sparkling May Day he had met a girl whose name he never learned. A girl he had laughingly
called Isolde, after the heroine in the medieval play performed that day at the festival. Foolish devilmay-care youth that he had been, he’d told her to call him Tristan.
Tristan and Isolde, lovers who defeated all obstacles to be together until fate tore them apart.
Now, still he could not forget her. And again it was driving him mad.
He drew a long breath. He must move on with his life. Perhaps a visit to that place after so long
would serve him as eight years upon the ocean had not. Perhaps seeing that tiny village again in the
gray dripping rain of March rather than beneath the early summer sun would knock him into finally
admitting that she had in fact been what he always feared.
Simply a dream.
Chapter Two
The prong would not budge.
Lady Patricia Morgan pressed her ribs into the edge of her worktable and squinted her eyes in the
lamplight, as though such wiggling would make the tiny metal protrusion obey. Her breaths came tight
and focused, her brow creased. But no matter how she prodded with the tip of the needle-thin pliers,
the filigree of gold would not move across the tiny diamond’s girdle.
“You wish to remain in that little divot of a flaw I did not see until it was too late, don’t you?” she
muttered to the recalcitrant prong. “But you will see, I will . . . Ah . . .” The pliers grasped just so, and
she felt the certainty of it in her fingertips. “Oh . . .” Her breaths came quick and short, her teeth
clenching. “Oo . . .”
“Tricky! A letter has arrived for you from Oliver’s solicitors.”
The pliers slipped, glancing off Patricia’s thumb with a scrape of skin. Glaring at the delicate band
of gold and diamonds fixed in the ring clamp, she reached for a cloth and enclosed her thumb in it.
“Thank you, Calanthia. You may leave it on the table.” She glanced at her younger sister then
returned her attention to the array of tools beside her. She hadn’t any smaller pliers, and this particular
ring would not bear anything larger.
“Didn’t you receive a letter from them only last week?” Calanthia set the envelope at Patricia’s
elbow and plopped down in the soft chair beside her stool. There was not space in the chamber for
more than the three pieces of furniture and her work chest. But she needn’t any more space in which to
make the rings. Only solitude.
Solitude was hard-won in the Morgan household.
“Your nephew’s estate requires a great deal of managing.” She ran her fingertips through her tools,
trusting. They often found what they needed best when she allowed them to feel their way naturally.
“How happy I might have been as a tinker’s daughter.”
“Don’t say that near the dowager. She despises tinkers.” Calanthia twirled a short strand of
shimmering carroty hair between her fingers. “She despises all tradesmen. A man from the butcher’s
came around the other day and she nearly took a strap to him, though I haven’t any idea what the poor
fellow could have said to send her flying into the boughs like that.”
That they had not paid their bills in a month and he would cease delivering to the stylish London
townhouse of young Sir John Morgan if his mother would not deliver some coin in return.
“My mother-in-law is of a sensitive nature.” Her fingers paused. The Swiss file! She would shave
the nasty little prong into submission.
“Aren’t you going to open it?”
“Not now, dear.” She set the file to the ring. It would be tricky . . . “And please, Callie, do not let
Lady Morgan hear you calling me that again. She believes it is beneath me.”
“But you don’t. May I open it?”
“Be my guest.” It was probably time Calanthia understood the straits in which Patricia’s sons were
now. Poor handling of Oliver’s funds by his former solicitors while he served in Spain had depleted
the estate. Only now, after three and a half years of careful planning and the dedicated work of a new
steward, was it returning slowly to order.
A pinch established itself between her shoulders and worked its way up her neck.
She had hoped to remain in London until funds would come from the countryside. But this news of
the butcher boded ill. They must soon remove again to the remote estate upon which Oliver had
sequestered her for five years, until he perished in Spain and she had been free to move to London as
she had long desired.
She glanced at Calanthia unfolding the pages and her heart caught. Her energetic young sister filled
the house with good spirit. But Patricia could not afford to bring her out into society as she deserved.
Callie must go live with their brother, Timothy, and his wife. She could not very well throw out
Oliver’s nasty mother or dear old maiden aunt, after all.
She returned her attention to the ring. The diamonds were barely chips. But they were all she could
afford.
It would be the last one. This she must also give up, her single passion other than her sons. Her
only passions since she had relinquished any hope of ever experiencing any other sort of passion. The
sort of passion of which she had once dreamed.
The pinch became a pain.
“Mama! Mama! Ramsay has bit me again!”
Two small tempests exploded into the room, carrot-headed like their aunt and entirely unlike
Patricia’s brown hair, knocking her table and sending her tools flying.
“I did not! John is lying!”
“I am not.” Her eldest son, six and full of the consequence due a baronet and in perfect imitation of
the father he had barely known, drew himself up to his slender height and lifted his chin. “Mama, I
will not have this insub— insubnordention in my house. You must send Ramsay off to school at
once.”
“Beast!” Ramsay banded his little arms about her waist and buried his face in her smock.
Setting down the file, she stroked her hand over her younger son’s soft curls and took a thoughtful
breath, the ache in her head intensifying. She looked into her elder son’s pale eyes and spoke softly.
“John, I believe you may find it more effective to address insubordination with mercy and
education about right behavior rather than threats of exile.” She bent to speak over Ramsay’s head.
“And you, Ramsay, will discover that if you cease attacking your brother with your teeth he will love
you more greatly and not wish to see you gone.”
“But he—” came muffled from her waist. “He said that— that tall man with the red waistcoat was
to be our new papa, and I do not like that man.”
“Hm. I see.” Patricia returned her gaze to her eldest. “John, why did you tell your brother that?”
“Grandmamma said it. She said a lady with two sons must have a husband and that Lord Perth is to
be our new papa.”
Pain leapt right over Patricia’s brow and down behind her eyes.
“Well, your grandmother likes Lord Perth, that is true. But I have no plans for him to become your
new papa. If I should even begin considering it, however, I will consult with you first.” She kissed
Ramsay’s curls. “Will that suit you?”
He lifted his head, his cheeks ruddy and damp. “Yes, Mama. Thank you, Mama.”
“And you, John?”
“Yes, Mama. I beg your pardon for telling an untruth.” But his face was too severe, too serious for
a boy of six. He wished for a father. He had told Patricia this many times, from nearly the moment he
could speak. Uncle Timothy was not enough, he once confided. He wished for a papa of his own.
“Now then, Nurse must be looking for you to put you to bed. I shall be up in a trice to tuck you in.”
She kissed her younger son on the top of his head and stroked her fingertips along John’s cheek. The
boys turned and stumbled through a quintet of fat little tawny dogs pushing into Patricia’s workroom.
Her mother-in-law appeared where her sons had been. Arrayed in bronze taffeta with a spray of black
feathers jutting from a bandeau, with yet another pug in her arms, the Dowager Lady Morgan took in
the scene with a pinched nose.
“You missed another exemplary musical fete, daughter. And what have you accomplished in its
stead?” She flicked a hand toward the tools scattered upon the floor. “Trinkets for worthless tarts.”
“They are not trinkets, Mother.” She bent to retrieve the tools. “They are wedding rings, and the
girls who receive them through the foundling hospital are not tarts. They are brides.” Poor brides. But
poverty was something the Dowager Lady Morgan would never understand. Even were Patricia to
show her the pile of bills upon her escritoire, her mother-in-law would sniff and say that ladies did not
pay bills.
Oliver had said the same thing in his letters from Spain. And his worthless solicitors had taken
advantage of that. Now, of course, she simply could not pay bills.
“Was there something you wished, Mother?” She picked up the last of her tools, scratched a pug
beneath its tiny ear, then began lining up the pliers neatly.
“Lord Perth has suggested to me that if you were to show him more encouragement he would not
be adverse to making you an offer.”
Patricia pivoted on her stool. “He suggested that to you? How remarkable.”
“I told him he should not look for encouragement from a lady, only modesty. But he seems
uncertain of your intentions.” She pursed her thin lips. “What are they, Patricia? To leave your sons
fatherless indefinitely?”
She swallowed tightly. “My intentions are not Lord Perth’s particular business.”
“You are an ungrateful girl. I always told my son that.”
Patricia swiveled back to face her work, her palms damp. “Your son knew that well enough all on
his own.” A chubby little dog bumped against her ankle and it felt far too comforting, warm and
affectionate and alive. “Is that all, Mother? I have quite a bit of work left to finish tonight.”
The dowager sniffed pointedly, fingers stroking the pug in her grasp. “Ladies do not work.”
Patricia’s megrim spiraled. “This lady does.” She plucked up the pliers. “Good night, Mother.
Sleep well.”
The rustle of fabric and pattering of twenty little paws signaled the dowager’s departure. Patricia
set the pliers to the diamond anew, her chest and throat tight. But it was no use. Her hands were no
longer steady.
Out of financial necessity she would cease this work she loved and her mother-in-law would
declare victory. She would send Calanthia to their brother’s house and lose the last ray of unrelenting
sunshine in her life. She would move the rest of her family to the country where their company would
be limited, with only sweet senile Aunt Elsbeth to defray the effects of the dowager’s daily
disparagements. She would do it all if she must.
But she would not marry a man she did not love. Not again. Not even for the sake of her sons. She
had done so once to suit her family. She had long since promised herself she would never do so again.
Instead, inside her where she was most wicked, another idea sparked. An idea she had dreamt for
months but hadn’t had the courage to think through entirely. A shameful idea that made her heart race
and head dizzy to truly consider now.
She would have an affair. She would experience passion. With a man.
The very thought of it swept the megrim quite away.
Married ladies occasionally talked, and Patricia had come to understand that it was possible for a
lady to feel more than pain or boredom during the marriage act. Lately her mind had fixed upon that
tantalizing notion until she was frantic for a taste of that something else. Perhaps it was the desperate
straits she had fallen into, or the sameness of her life every day despite her troubles.
She needed a holiday. She needed passion. She wanted laughter and desire and to feel freely alive
again. She certainly would not feel it with Lord Henry Perth, a fine gentleman in his stiff, stoic
English sobriety. Just like Oliver. But if she must wed again eventually, would it be so wrong to live a
little—for even a day, a night—before that?
She breathed a silent sigh.
It was pure fantasy, of course. In London where she lived the portrait existence of a proper widow,
if she were found out it could be disastrous. She had her sons to consider, and Callie whose
introduction into society the following year must not be tainted by gossip.
Perhaps even more to the point, true ladies did not indulge in fits of passion or even excessive
affection. Her mother had taught her that, and Oliver reinforced it. In those first months of marriage
she had been so unhappy. But after that, even when she tried to give him warmth, all he had ever
wanted of her was one thing, and even that he had done without feeling. No warmth at all. No passion.
Finally she had given up trying. When he purchased a commission and headed off to war, they had
both known why.
But all men were not like Oliver. Some were passionate. She had kissed a man of that sort once. On
one perfect day she had tasted heaven.
She positioned the pliers at the diamond’s girdle anew. Her hands were steady again, her breathing
even. Merely indulging in thoughts of her fantasy calmed her.
“Tricky?” From her place sunk in the chair, Calanthia’s voice was unusually soft.
“What is it, dear?”
“This is not a letter from Oliver’s solicitor.” She lifted a round gaze. “It is a letter from Oliver
himself.”
Patricia’s hands stilled upon her tool.
“From Oliver Morgan? My husband?”
“Read it.”
A top sheet of engraved stationery from Oliver’s solicitor included one line only: 1 March 1816.
Dear Lady Morgan, I am instructed to deliver this to you at this time. Yours &c., Harold Glover . The
other page was written in Oliver’s familiar, passionless script, but peculiarly thin and uneven. It was
dated three days after the Battle of Salamanca in which he was wounded. The day before his death.
25 July 1812
Salamanca, Spain
Lady Patricia Ramsay Morgan
Lowescroft
Bradford, England
My dear wife,
You are no doubt wondering what I must say to you at this final moment. I have never been
demonstrative, and rest assured I will not become so now upon the eve of my death. For I am quite
certain that I shall die shortly. My wound is grave and the doctors are not optimistic.
Before I leave you to this present world a widow, however, I must enjoin upon you a final task. I
ask it of you for the sake of our sons to whom I have been a poor father. I offer one caveat before I
continue: if you are once again wed—and more happily this time, I pray—do not read this letter.
Rather, throw it into the grate and allow the flames to consume it. For in this case I have no more
authority over you, and your new husband has all that I have already lost. But if you are not yet
wed again, I beg of you, do as I request. It is a last wish from a husband who should have been a
better one to you but who knew not how.
Not long ago I caused to have buried in the ground in England an object of great value. Its
retrieval will ensure our sons’ future happiness. Recall the home of your distant cousins at which
we became betrothed. You must go there to retrieve the object, but you must do so within a
fortnight of receiving this letter.
I leave you now with a final word, one of gratitude. You have been an excellent mother to our
children. You were—despite all—an exemplary wife to me. I wish you every happiness and God’s
blessings.
Yours,
Oliver Christopher Morgan, III
Patricia sat mute, her eyes prickling.
“Tricky? Are you all right?”
She blinked, sweeping her hand across her eyes and dashing away a pair of tears.
“Yes. Quite all right.”
“You are?”
She nodded, a little surprised at the truth of her words. His final thanks and blessing was more than
she had ever had from him in life. It was far too late and far too little, of course. But she had learned
quite early in their marriage that he had not been capable of expressing more. She no longer faulted
him for it.
And now she could thank him for the opportunity he afforded her.
She folded up the pages and tucked them in her pocket. “I will ask Aunt Elsbeth to accompany
me.”
Her sister gaped. “Will you do it, then?”
“Of course. Why shouldn’t I?”
“But—” Callie sat forward. “But, Tricky, you haven’t any idea what he is sending you to. And for
goodness sake it could be long gone by now!”
She tilted her head. “For a girl of usually high spirits, you are reacting to this rather oddly.”
“I suppose I am simply flabbergasted. I have never received a letter from a dead husband I did not
like above half. I cannot imagine how you must feel right now.”
“I feel fine.” Better than fine. Tingling, in fact. She glanced at her work. She could not finish it
tonight. Now she must pack for her journey. She stood up and untied her apron.
Callie leapt out of her chair. “I will go with you.”
Patricia’s brow creased. If she were going to do what she was considering, she could not very well
have her seventeen-year-old sister in tow.
“You must remain here to comfort John and Ramsay in my brief absence.”
“They will have Nurse, and John’s tutor, and of course their horrid grandmother. And I am the only
person who knows how to rub Aunt Elsbeth’s feet when they get the cramps. If you are going to take
her as chaperone, you must take me too.”
“Hm.” She considered her sister’s bright eyes, bluer than her own and full of animation. Once she
had been that same age, and she had met a man who made her head spin and heart stop. Calanthia did
not know that, of course; Patricia had only ever told her diary of it. But after bearing the dowager’s
company for nearly four years, her sister deserved a holiday too.
“All right.”
“Oh, Tricky, you are tremendous!” She threw her arms about her and squeezed. Patricia held the
embrace, savoring the closeness.
Calanthia hopped to the door. “I am off to pack. Oh, I simply cannot wait to see Lady Morgan’s
face pinch up like a prune when she hears about this!” She dashed from the chamber.
Patricia withdrew the letter and opened it again. The journey would require several days, just as it
had nine years ago in the opposite direction—that journey commenced on the same day Oliver had
asked her to be his bride, a full day after he had already signed the betrothal contract with her father.
But this time Patricia was not betrothed. And she was not to be married to one man while her heart
longed for another. Upon this journey, she would not be weeping tears that for the next months seemed
to have no end except when she hid them from her new husband.
On this journey she would be free. A respectable widow. A woman with a family, barely a penny in
her purse, and an aching desire for an experience that would bring her to life again for a moment.
Upon the road, a lady was bound to encounter at least one man willing to oblige her fantasy. A man to
offer her a taste of passion for a single night, passion that would rekindle feelings she had only ever
felt once.
This time, however, if she happened to come across a handsome gentleman who made her feel
alive from the inside out, she would learn his name before he disappeared forever.
Chapter Three
“ ’Tis only a strain, mum.”
Rain fell in a mizzling shroud across the muddy highway and dripped off the brim of Patricia’s
bonnet. Only two of the carriage horses still rested in their traces. The coachman had detached the
leaders to walk them about. The left leader limped dramatically.
Patricia wrinkled her brow. “Only a strain?”
“Aye, mum. He’ll be better in a jiffy, I ’spect.”
“What is a jiffy precisely in this case, Carr?”
“Two days. P’raps three if I put a poultice on it right quick. I’ll know better in the morning, mum.”
She looked up the road, then in the opposite direction. Little could be seen but shadows of trees and
the edges of fields hemmed in by stone fences. But according to Oliver’s letter, there should be an inn
close by.
“Then we will drive to the nearest posting house and change them out before continuing,” she said
bracingly.
“Could, mum.” Carr nodded. “If he could do it.”
“The horse is no longer able to pull the carriage?”
Carr shook his head and scratched beneath the brim of his high-crown hat. “ ’Fraid not, mum. Less
you’d like him good for naught else again.”
“No, of course not.” She glanced at the complex harnessing. “Can you tie him behind and drive the
others until we reach the posting house?”
“No, mum.” He looked chagrined. “Begging your pardon.”
“Hm.” She took a deep breath and released it upon a puff. “Then we must simply wait for help to
happen by.”
“I could ride on ahead?” He looked doubtful.
“No. That would leave us quite unprotected. We will wait it out.” She dusted the rain from her
cloak and climbed back into the carriage. Within, Callie’s blue eyes sparkled with curiosity and Aunt
Elsbeth’s prominent gray orbs looked pleasantly smudgy as usual.
“The lead horse has suffered a strained fetlock.” She patted Oliver’s maiden aunt’s hand. “But you
needn’t worry. Help will be along shortly and we will be on our way to a nice cozy inn before we know
it.”
“Dear me, Patricia.” Aunt Elsbeth’s thin, tripping tones were somewhat musical. “You do say the
oddest things.”
She laughed. “But it is true, Aunt Elsbeth.”
“I daresay that farm will do well enough for the afternoon.” The elderly lady bobbed her head, a
tangled mass of silk flowers jiggling in reds, blues and yellows atop her bonnet, crinkles at the edges
of her mouth.
Patricia peered out the window. “Did you see a farm, then?”
“Oh, no, my dear. Not for months now.”
Patricia flicked her gaze to her sister. Calanthia grinned and rolled her bright eyes, then tucked her
hand in Aunt Elsbeth’s elbow.
“Auntie, tell us at what distance we sit now from that farm, if you will.”
“We are a quarter mile past it, I should say.”
Callie cuddled closer to the elderly lady. “And what are they serving for dinner today at the farm?”
“Mutton stew.”
“There, Tricky. We shall have mutton stew in short order. Shall we walk? Although it would be a
great deal more diverting to remain here and be accosted by a highwayman, I suspect. I have heard
such bandits are excessively roguish.”
Patricia tried not to smile. Aunt Elsbeth would meander, and Callie would play, just as they did at
home in London. They seemed content enough, despite the cold creeping through gloves and shoes.
“Mum,” Carr called from without. “Rider’s coming along.”
She opened the door and poked her head out.
“Does it look like a highwayman, Tricky?”
“I am not perfectly familiar with the physical attributes of highwaymen, sister, but I shall ask him.
If he replies in the affirmative I will inform you directly.”
“Splendid!”
The rider neared. Unfortunately for Calanthia, he looked unexceptionably like a gentleman, in an
elegant caped greatcoat and brimmed hat, a saddle pack behind him. His handsome horse loped along
the muddy road with ease. Patricia set her foot upon the step.
“Ask him about the farm,” Callie chirped.
Patricia grinned and climbed out into the drizzle.
“He has slowed his horse to a walk, Auntie.” Callie peeked out and narrated for Aunt Elsbeth
within. “Oh, bother. He is dismounting. That is certainly not the action of a bandit. He is very tall and
walks with great confidence, but he brandishes no pistol. How disappointing.”
“Calanthia,” Patricia whispered, “be still.” She adopted a gracious smile and turned to the
gentleman walking toward the carriage. “Good day, sir. I wonder if we might prevail upon you to . . .”
She got no further.
He halted as her speech did, four yards away.
Her breathing stopped.
His eyes widened for an instant. Green eyes. She knew this even across the space between them
now.
She knew it from her memory.
It was he. Tristan. After nine years.
But she must be wrong. This man’s face was not the same as in her memory. In the pale light of the
misty day his skin appeared tanned. A firm jaw and smooth cheeks flanked not smiling lips and a long
straight nose, but the hard line of a mouth and a nose at least once broken.
His lips parted slightly, as though he might speak. Then he removed his hat and bowed with
military precision. His hair was as she remembered it, nearly black although very short. He
straightened and replaced the hat, obscuring in shadow once more the dark, rich emeralds that had
once gazed at her with thorough longing.
“Good day, madam. May I be of assistance?”
Patricia could not find her voice. His was the same, only altered slightly, deepened by the breadth
of his chest which seemed wider. His shoulders as well. The years had rendered the youth a man.
“Tricky,” her sister whispered and poked her in the kidneys.
Patricia knew not how she managed to curtsy. Her breaths would not return to her compressed
chest and her entire body felt shaky. She had not until this moment realized that she never expected to
see him again. For months she had dreamed. For years she had wondered. But she never truly believed
she would, convincing herself that her young, hungry imagination had invented him.
But England was not such a large place after all. She had been a fool.
“Thank you, sir.” Her voice sounded odd and stiff, the rain dulling sounds all about. “We have
horse trouble and cannot continue to the inn ahead.”
“There is a farm not a quarter mile behind,” he said without hesitation, winning a titter from within
the carriage. “I will ride back and return with an alternate conveyance. Does your coachman carry a
pistol?”
There was no gracious solicitation here, no hint of recognition beyond that first brief pause. Only
attention to necessity.
“I believe so. Carr?”
“Yes, mum.” Carr pulled aside his coat to reveal the butt of a weapon.
“See that you use it if necessary.” He spoke with complete authority, as though accustomed to
giving orders. He turned and remounted. “I will return shortly.” He bowed from the saddle, circled his
horse about and with a smacking of hooves in mud, set off at a canter.
Patricia pressed a hand to her chest, to force breath into her lungs or to still her pounding heart, she
hardly knew.
Tristan. The man over whom she had cried a thousand tears. Come to life. Appearing upon a rainy
road in the middle of nowhere.
“He has gone to fetch us another carriage, Auntie,” she heard Calanthia say cheerily. “And you will
not believe it when you see him—he is very handsome. I daresay we should be stranded upon the road
more often if such gentlemen will appear to rescue us.”
There was no carriage to be found at the farm, of course, only a wagon without covering. But it must
suffice. Afternoon was fast waning and the rain would darken the road before the sun set. So it was on
land, just as on the sea.
Nik commandeered the wagon and the farmer to drive it. In a lengthy exposition the farmer
explained his eldest son’s inability to drive now on account of an injury involving a bale of hay, a
pitchfork, an overly feisty cow, and a pretty dairymaid.
“Females,” the farmer spat. “Always a female, ain’t it, sir?”
Always a female, indeed.
Nik had sailors as loquacious as the farmer aboard his ship; he did not mind the chatter. Indeed, he
welcomed it. Anything to force his mind into a semblance of order resembling the order that had
reigned in his life for eight years since he ran away to the Navy because of a woman. The woman
stranded upon the road before him now.
You must join the Navy and become a great ship captain! You will be the scourge of Napoleon’s
fleet.
She was entirely altered. Her cheeks, once rosy as a ripe peach and dimpled, were now hollowed
and pale, rendering her chin more angled and casting shadows beneath her eyes. Her hair, then as
multifaceted as autumn leaves and shining in the sunlight as it slipped out of its ribbons, now
disappeared in a tight knot beneath her sober bonnet. And her mouth, lips he remembered as the
sweetest, softest dusky rose, and full enough to drive a man mad imagining them upon him . . .
She had smiled until she recognized him. Then her smooth cheeks and sensuous lips had gone pale
as a specter’s.
If Nik needed any sign to confirm that she remembered him and had no desire to meet him again,
he now had that sign. His chest felt tight and he felt like a reckless, uncertain youth still. A war hero
brought down finally by a woman’s blank stare.
But it was merely confirmation of what he had suspected even then.
From the moment he had first caught a glimpse of her that morning, her hair sparkling in the early
summer sunshine and elegant dress caressing her young curves, he’d known he was not good enough
for her. He had never been good enough for anything, as his father and elder brothers never hesitated
to remind him. Never intelligent enough, never disciplined enough, never talented enough to merit
praise or even much attention other than censure. He was nothing more than a careless wastrel. That
she had laughed and smiled and allowed him to kiss her had not changed that, no matter how he
wished otherwise. By the end of that golden day he had determined that in order to win her he would
make something of himself. It would be that simple.
But she had not met him the following morning as planned, and she could not be found. So he had
gone to war to make something else entirely of himself.
He spurred his mount onward. The carriage appeared in the gray ahead, the horses sodden in their
traces. After a full day in the saddle, Nik was tired and sore. But if Jag’s instructions and his own
memory were correct, the route offered an inn not five miles distant. With the wagon, it might be
reached before nightfall.
She came out of the carriage and peered down the road behind him.
“Ah. What good fortune.” She clasped gloved hands before her. She was still slender, the curve of
her shoulders and rise of her breasts barely discernable beneath her cloak. “Thank you, sir.”
“A wagon?” A young lady poked her bright head through the doorway. “How singular!”
He bowed. “I fear the options were limited, ma’am. It was either this or the donkey cart. I dared to
decide for you.”
The girl giggled, dimpling up in a manner so familiar—so gut grabbingly familiar, so emblazoned
in his memory—he knew she must be a relation. He shifted his gaze to the lady he had not been able to
forget in nine years, then wished he had not.
Her blue eyes—eyes he had lost himself in once before—were trained upon him, thick-lashed and
wide, cornflowers set in a face too lovely to be real. Lovely, not because he remembered it glowing
with youthful innocence and desire. Not because that face had not changed, for it had. But because
now, as then when he had first seen her in the crowd at the festival and lost his breath, she was to him
the most beautiful thing he had ever beheld.
He could not deny it to himself. He did not even wish to.
“It will do splendidly, of course,” she only said. “Carr, it will be dark within an hour. Will you be
comfortable remaining here with the carriage and horses until help can be sent back?”
“ ’Course, mum. Don’t you be worrying on me.” He nodded her along then began unstrapping the
luggage from the top of the vehicle.
Nik extended his hand for the girl inside and she jumped down lightly.
“This is a most provident adventure!”
“Mishaps upon highways in the rain and mud cannot be considered anything but, ma’am.”
“You are quizzing and we are hardly known to one another!” Her eyes twinkled. “Oh, Tricky, I am
quite glad he was not a highwayman after all. You are not, are you, sir?”
“Not for years now.”
“Then I am terribly disappointed we did not encounter you earlier in life.” She giggled, all silly
girlish glee. Not like that other girl he remembered as though it were yesterday. That girl had laughed
freely, but with quiet grace. Her eyes had sparkled but her lashes allowed only a glimmer of that joy to
shine forth. She had been fervent yet modest, and she had not directly told him her feelings that day,
an omission which he noted far too late.